Criticisms of Pascal

Another common criticism is the claim that no sense can be made of the idea of an infinite gain, or utility , at least, standard decision theory cannot consistently handle payoffs. Is an infinite gain or utility a good so supreme that one should be willing to pay any finite cost for a chance at gaining such a prize? If the idea of an infinite utility is abandoned, then the possibility that God exists will play a much more influential role in the wager, but a prudentially modest wager is imaginable.

1. Zero probability for God’s existence

Many 'strong' atheists claim that the probability that God exists is indeed zero. There are a number of arguments they might use to justify this belief, such as the problem of evil, or the problem of unjustifiable suffering.

Strict atheists may insist on the rationality of a probability assignment of 0, as Oppy 1990 among others points out. For example, they may contend that reason alone can settle that God does not exist, perhaps by arguing that the very notion of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent being is contradictory. Or a Bayesian might hold that rationality places no constraint on probabilistic judgments beyond coherence (or conformity to the probability calculus).

The flaw in the argument is that it is based on the assumption that the two possibilities are equally likely -- or at least, that they are of comparable likelihood. If, in fact, the possibility of there being a God is close to zero, the argument becomes much less persuasive. Then as long as the strict atheist assigns probability 1 to God’s non-existence alongside his or her assignment of 0 to God’s existence, no norm of rationality has been violated.

2. Undefined probability for God’s existence

Alternatively, some agnostics might claim that the probability that God exists is completely undefined. We know so little about the universe in general, and God in particular, that any attempt to place a number would be irrelevant. As such, the Wager doesn't even get off the ground. The correct behaviour when faced with undefined probabilities is not obvious - some say that an assumption of 50% should be made, others that the correct behaviour must be deduced from other considerations, or that there is no 'best' decision.

Frequentism (or operationalism) is the mathematical standpoint that probability can only be defined on the basis of performing multiple experiments, and because there is no experiment to perform to determine the existence of God, it is undefined. The frequentist standpoint was undermined somewhat when it was pointed out that the only way a frequentist could determine the probability of the moon being made of blue cheese was to visit it a large number of times, and each time check whether it was made of a dairy product. Many people find this concept laughably dumb.

The argument presupposes that you should have a probability for God's existence in the first place. However, perhaps you could rationally fail to assign it a probability---your probability that God exists could remain undefined. We cannot enter here into the thorny issues concerning the attribution of probabilities to agents. But there is some support for this response even in Pascal’s own text, again at the pivotal claim that "reason can decide nothing here. There is an infinite chaos which separated us. A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance where heads or tails will turn up..." The thought could be that any probability assignment is inconsistent with a state of "epistemic nullity" (in Morris'1986 phrase): to assign a probability at all---even 1/2---to God's existence is to feign having evidence that one in fact totally lacks. For unlike a coin that we know to be fair, this metaphorical "coin" is "infinitely far" from us, hence apparently completely unknown to us. Perhaps, then, rationality actually requires us to refrain from assigning a probability to God’s existence (in which case at least the Argument from dominance would be valid). Or perhaps rationality does not require it, but at least permits it. Either way, the Wager would not even get off the ground.

Worse still, some people find that Pascal's Wager itself is an argument that disproves God's existence. They say that Pascal's Wager could be used to require belief in any proposition P of the form: 'Belief in proposition P will bring an infinite reward and X'. This would lead to a large number of mutually exclusive beliefs, which would be irrational. Therefore, any such proposition must be false. This is not a totally sound logic, though, as it pre-supposes that the universe is, in fact, totally rational - a hotly contested viewpoint.

Go to Nature of God

Reference:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pascal-wager/#1

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